Who Likes Santorum?

[Santorum] has plenty of ideological compromises in his past, but nothing like Gingrich’s long list of tergiversations; his debating style can be sour and off-putting, but compared to Perry he’s Cicero. His foreign policy views are hawkish to the point of folly, but he isn’t competing for the Ron Paul/Jon Huntsman slice of the G.O.P. electorate, and this isn’t a foreign policy election anyway. He doesn’t have money or organization, but neither did Gingrich when he was being taken seriously as a contender — and if Santorum wins Iowa, he’ll get a fundraising boost in a hurry. And because he’s a Pennsylvanian Catholic rather than a Southern evangelical, he might actually play better than Perry would (or than Huckabee did in ’08) north of the Mason-Dixon line.

The neocons are also in Santorum's corner, as he is dedicated to their third hoped-for war on a Muslim country in a decade. Here's Jennifer Rubin:

If Santorum could clear the field he’d have a shot in a state ideally suited to some economic populism and rock-solid social conservatism. It becomes monumentally more difficult, considering Romney’s money advantage and the momentum coming out of the first two primaries, for him to win outright in South Carolina with everyone else still in the race.

As I checked in to my hotel here tonight, the first person I ran into in the lobby was Rick Santorum. Accompanied by his family, he (and they) seemed in a good mood—which was made even better when I told him I wasn't going to write a post predicting his victory, because it would just jinx him.